Open Target

An officer out in the cold

He was an honest cop in the Frank Serpico mold. Early in the spring of 1982, A'Roterick McLaughlin, a 15-year veteran of the Chicago police force, went undercover to nab officers who dealt drugs, sometimes peddling the stuff from their squad-car windows. He played the role of a neophyte dealer, wearing miniature microphones when he met with corrupt police. His work led to the conviction of ten policemen and the indictment of three others, none of whom have yet started serving any time in prison. It also made him a target for revenge.

McLaughlin assumed a new name and was relocated, along with his wife and their three children, to a city in Georgia. Now, two years after he left Chicago, McLaughlin is convinced he has been discovered and marked for death. He says that he was stopped last month by three men on a street near his new home. Brandishing a pistol, one of the men ordered him to get into a waiting car. The three strangers drove McLaughlin to a deserted wooded area, forced him out of the car and began beating him, at one point brutally stomping on his head. "Cut his hand off! Cut his hand off!" one of the trio yelled. Recalls McLaughlin: "I came up fighting then. I took off running. I was bleeding everywhere, and I heard a shot ring out behind me." He made it to the safety of a well-traveled street and called the police. But the assault may have permanently destroyed the vision in McLaughlin's right eye.

Officials at the Cook County state's attorney's office, which paid for McLaughlin's relocation, say the incident was simply a robbery (McLaughlin's attackers did take his watch). "There is absolutely nothing to indicate these three men knew who their victim was," says Assistant State's Attorney John Armellino. "We are limited by law as to what we can do for a witness," says Prosecutor Frank DeBoni, "and right now we do not think this man is in imminent danger."

Thomas Chandler and Victor Howard, two internal-affairs division officers who worked with McLaughlin in uncovering the drug ring, strongly disagree. They also claim to have been threatened recently; a package arrived last month at their Chicago headquarters with cut-up animal parts, two dead fish, and a note reading, "Death for you and yours." Howard says that McLaughlin's assailants knew who he was: "The message those attackers gave him was 'You broke the code, and nobody is going to get away with that.' " A police officer in Georgia who is familiar with the case, explaining why some facts were not included in the public report of the incident, confirmed that McLaughlin is considered in danger and that "maybe someone is out to get him."

McLaughlin, who allowed TIME to use his real name but requested that his current home town be kept secret, has no doubt that his ordeal stems from his undercover work. After pressure by McLaughlin, Howard and Chandler, and inquiries by reporters, Chicago officials agreed late last week to pay for his relocation to a new, undisclosed place. "If I had to do it all over again, I don't think I would," he says. "No one told me it would be this way. I was just trying to do my job, be a good cop, do what I thought was right."